1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to an exercise apparatus. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to the exercise apparatus (or called “Elliptical”) which can guide user's foot to move along an elliptic closed path.
2. Description of Related Art
The “Elliptical” or “Elliptical exercise apparatus” is an exercise apparatus which can guide a user's foot to move along an elliptic closed path, such as a stationary exercise apparatus disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,540,637. This kind of exercise apparatus faces the dilemma of having a longer pedal stroke or occupying a smaller footprint. For example, the longer the crank units' length of the stationary exercise apparatus is, the longer the pedal stroke (a long axis length or a front-rear direction length) is. Although the longer pedal stroke provides an adequate leg exercise for the user, the length of the stationary exercise apparatus increases so that it occupies larger space and area. On the other hand, a shorter crank units' length help save the space, but it will restrict the leg exercise. Especially in models designed for home, how to design the structure of the exercise apparatus to be more streamline and smaller under the premise of providing sufficient exercise or to provide a longer stroke of movement under the stringent limitation of volume or length has became one of the efforts in the direction of the related designer.
In addition to design the pedal path having the sufficient length, the overall shape and the dynamic of the path should conform with ergonomics in order to have the natural and comfortable leg movement. For counterexample, improper length ratio of a major axis and a minor axis of the pedal path like a too flat or round ellipse, obvious asymmetry of the closed path like an oval, the top side of the closed path forms a concave arc like meniscus, or (compare with the crank units which rotate in a constant speed) the pedals move unsteadily along the path, all of these conditions can lead the user to feel unnatural or unsmooth during exercising.
Apart from having the sufficient total length, if the angle respect to the ground of the pedal path is designed adjustable, that is, the pedal path is “inclination adjustable” or “slope adjustable”, and conforms with ergonomics within the adjustment range as well, then this kind of exercise apparatus can provide an even richer and more comprehensive training for the user.
When the exercise apparatus having a sufficient space, such as U.S. Pat. No. 5,540,637, the handles design is usually not a problem, and can be very easy on designing the ergonomic handles. However, when the space is narrowed, setting the handles properly within the limited space and looking after three sides of lower-cost, easy manufactured, as well as ergonomics conformed are difficult problems. For example, an arm 140 of U.S. Pat. No. 7,153,239 is extended upward to form a handle 144. The arm 140 and the handle 144 are jointly and pivotally coupled to the inner side of the U-shaped frame. Although the foregoing mechanism is simple and easy to manufacture, it has at least two disadvantages. First, the inner side of the U-shaped frame and the upper side of a pedal 133 of an elliptical 100 are an exercising space supplied for the user obviously. If the handles are pivotally coupled to two ends of the inner side of the U-shaped frame respectively, it will directly reduce the exercising space and more likely cause inconvenient to use and non-ergonomic. On the other hand, if the width between two pivotal points of the two handles 144 meets the basic needs, it would increase the whole width of the frame. Second, the handles are unilateral pivotally coupled to the U-shaped frame. The handles are more prone to malfunction due to the unilateral force.
Moreover, the manufacturers want to reduce the storage and transportation costs of the exercise apparatus (as a variety of indoor exercise apparatuses), so that they usually disassemble the exercise apparatus into several parts and congest it into a smaller carton when packaging. After purchasing the exercise apparatus, the user must be in accordance with the guidelines of the assembly manual to build the scattered parts up to a completed exercise apparatus. In this way, the operation will be very tedious and laborious for the user.